On Tue, 17 Jun 1997, Greg Trotter <greg@ou.edu> wrote:
...> What would be interesting to know is: what is the most cost-effective> DESCHALL client platform? I have a feeling that it is probably a> multi-processor PPC or Pentium box. Beats me -- I don't have any. The> computer on my desk gets about 650 keys per US dollar per second (for the> CPU, not including monitor). Any other comparisons?>

A week or so back I did an estimate, the 64 Sparc Ultra processor
multi-million dollar Starfire John is running could be matched in
DESCHALL performance via 64 Dual PPro 200MHz boxes (though 180MHz
may be best price/performance). Glancing at microtimes I see I could
pick up a very stripped-down Dual PPro for about $1600. Hence my
estimate of $100,000 to get about 0.125 GKPS (billion keys/sec).
I suppose this is 1250 keys/$. My guess is 4-way PPro wouldn't be
as good since the motherboards tend to cost a bunch more.

Since then the ultra deschall clients have doubled in speed, so then
now $200,000 to match a 64-way Starfire for this problem with these clients.